Pre-K + Kinder Immersion

For families interested in session-based Pre-K and Kindergarten Immersion, Chinese with Meggie offers two Language Immersion Programs for toddler, pre-k, and kindergarten students: the Beginning Immersion Program, and the Advanced Immersion Program. In both programs, we take advantage of young children’s unique abilities to develop listening, speaking, reading (for Advance Immersion Program) skills through exposure and engagement. Students develop these skills in a way that mimics the acquisition of a native language.

Beginning Immersion Program

In our beginning immersion program, we work with students between 18 months and 6 years of age. Classes are divided in an age-appropriate fashion: 1.5-2.5 years old; 2.5-4 years old; 4-6 years old, and the class size for each group is controlled with a limit of 5-6 students per class.

Since every class minute is precious in exposing our children to Chinese, we make our 2-hour classes fully immersive and content-rich. Each 2-hour class covers the following activities with certain activities repeating several times depending on the needs of the day and the atmosphere of the class: Singing, Circle, Story Time, Snack Time, and Clean-up Time. Great emphasis is placed on contextual learning so that even activities such as Snack Time and Clean-up Time serve as opportunities to engage students with the Chinese language.

Singing Time: This time is spent singing Chinese songs and also doing some physical exercises. Songs that emphasize relevant vocabulary and sentence structures are used in order to reinforce lessons.

Story Time: Every 2-hour class typically includes two separate Story Times. Children listen as picture books are read in Chinese. Our small class sizes ensure that all children are actively engaged during Story Time.

Circle Time: Approximately three separate Circle Times take place during each 2-hour session. Children participate in various activities and games such as playing with Chinese flashcards. All activities are designed to foster language acquisition as well as mental development. When weather permits, outdoor Chinese activities are also sometimes arranged.
If a child’s birthday falls on the week, there is also special birthday Cake Time. During this time, the whole class will sing Happy Birthday in Chinese while feasting on a toy cake.

Snack Time: This time is utilized not only for eating or drinking, but as an excellent opportunity to expose students to Chinese language relevant to the activity. We provide simple snacks and water (per students’ individual dietary restrictions), but parents are also welcome to prepare and send snacks for their own children.

Clean-up Time: Children use this time to collect all the toys and books used in class. As with all of our activities, context-based learning is emphasized, so children learn Chinese relevant to their cleaning activities during this time.

Because immersion requires regular, focused periods of learning, we ask that students enroll for a minimum of two 2-hour sessions per week.

Advanced Immersion Program

Our advanced immersion program is geared towards students who have already developed their fundamental listening and speaking skills in our beginning immersion program, and the class size for each group is controlled with a limit of 6 students per class. In addition to participating in classroom activities similar to those used in the beginning immersion program, students in the advanced immersion do subject-based learning entirely in Chinese. Topics include insects, climate, Chinese poetry etc. Students also begin to read Chinese characters, then phrases, sentences, and simple stories.

This experience reading in Chinese also benefits the children by deepening their core speaking and listening skills. Children are also usually very excited to discover that they possess the ability to learn to read Chinese characters. This exposure to Chinese characters serves as the foundation for Chinese literacy, preparing them to learn Chinese character writing later on.

Students enrolling in the advanced immersion program are selected by our teachers at the end of each semester. We consider it very important that students enrolling in this program are ready both from the perspective of their Chinese skills and maturity. Therefore, the selection criteria are based on the teachers’ assessment of the student’s Chinese language skill and overall readiness. Also, to ensure continual progress, it is very important for students enrolling in this program have regular and intensive exposure to Chinese. Therefore, children are required to attend a minimum of two 2-hour immersion sessions per week in order to be eligible for the advanced immersion program.

Classes are offered Monday through Thursday. Weekday meetings are from 9:00-11:00am, 11:15am-1:15pm, 1:30pm-3:30pm, and 3:45pm-5:45pm. Weekend meetings are from 9:00 – 11:00am, 11:15am – 1:15pm. Please contact us for information about tuition, scheduling, and availability.